page_title: Ludwigsburg Palace
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Ludwigsburg Palace / History
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Herzog Eberhard Ludwig von Württemberg (1693-1733), Kaiserlicher General der Kavallerie, seit 09. 07. 1703 Reichsgeneral der Kavallerie, seit 09. 09. 1712 (ev.) Reichsgeneralfeldmarschall
context_page_description: Ludwigsburg Palace, nicknamed the "Versailles of Swabia", is a 452-room palace complex of 18 buildings located in Ludwigsburg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Its total area, including the gardens, is 32 ha – the largest palatial estate in the country. The palace has four wings: the northern wing, the Alter Hauptbau, is the oldest and was used as a ducal residence; the east and west wings were used for court purposes and housing guests and courtiers; the southern wing, the Neuer Hauptbau, was built to house more court functions and was later used as a residence.
  Eberhard Louis, Duke of Württemberg, appointed Philipp Joseph Jenisch to direct the work and construction began in 1704. In 1707, Jenisch was replaced with Johann Friedrich Nette, who completed the majority of the palace and surrounding gardens. Nette died in 1714, and Donato Giuseppe Frisoni finished much of the palace facades. In the final year of construction, Eberhard Louis died and the Neue Hauptbau's interiors were left incomplete. Charles Eugene's court architect, Philippe de La Guêpière, completed and refurbished parts of the New Hauptbau in the Rococo style, especially the palace theatre.
context_section_description: "Ludwigsburg," meaning "Louis's castle," was named after its builder, Eberhard Louis, Duke of Württemberg, in 1705. It had been previously known as the Erlachhof, a traditional hunting estate and lodge of the Dukes of Württemberg that was destroyed in 1692, during the Nine Years' War. Eberhard Louis commissioned a replacement lodge that was built from 1697 to 1701. Construction was interrupted by the beginning of the War of the Spanish Succession, fought against France and Bavaria. Württemberg resisted entry into the war until late 1702. Two years later, Eberhard Louis participated in the Allied victory at the Battle of Blenheim that was followed by the exile of the Bavarian Elector. The duke used the battle to press claims to Bavarian lands, but he illegally occupied those lands and was further weakened by a French invasion of Württemberg in 1707. As a result of this attack, the ducal residence in the capital, Stuttgart, was burned and the royal family fled to Switzerland. With the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, the occupied Bavarian territory and status of the exiled Elector were restored.
  Construction of Ludwigsburg Palace began in May 1704 with the laying of the Alter Hauptbau's cornerstone by Eberhard Louis. The year before, he sent Philipp Joseph Jenisch to study architecture abroad. Eberhard Louis made Jenisch director of construction upon his return the next year, but he only managed to finish the Alter Hauptbau's (Old main building) first floor and some of the southern garden before 1707. The duke spent the winter of 1705–06 at Nymphenburg Palace, residence of the Elector of Bavaria, and was impressed by what he saw there and in architectural publications. Unable to compete with Bavaria militarily or politically, Eberhard Louis decided to build a new palace and town inspired by Versailles, which would be the center of his domestic society and diplomacy. Located 10 kilometers (6.2 mi) from Stuttgart, Eberhard Louis could set up a court with his mistress, Wilhelmine von Grävenitz, and demonstrate his absolutist status as a monarch. Eberhard Louis lost faith in Jenisch's ability and in 1707 replaced him with Johann Friedrich Nette, an engineer. By 1709, it had become apparent that the massive undertaking of the palace's construction eventually necessitated the building of a town, also known as Ludwigsburg. That cost of construction provoked financial consequences, opposition at court, and criticism from the populace. A major retrenchment of court functions took place in 1709 that shrank the orchestra to eight members. That same year, after a fatal workplace accident at the palace, a pastor in nearby Oßweil said of the palace at his pulpit, "May God spare our land the chastising that the Ludwigsburg brood of sinners conjure."
caption: Eberhard Louis, Duke of Württemberg, known in German as Eberhard Ludwig, as he appeared in 1720
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